TECHNOLOGY
Weather-tech company launches second radar satellite
Boston weather-tech startup Tomorrow.io launched its second radar satellite this week and raised a new round of venture capital backing. The successful launch of the company’s “R2″ satellite on Monday followed its first weather radar-equipped spacecraft launched in April. The company’s two commercial satellites are the only satellites carrying active weather radar gear apart from a single NASA satellite. Ultimately, Tomorrow.io plans to create a constellation of more than 20 radar and microwave-equipped satellites to provide global weather monitoring coverage. Tomorrow.io also raised $87 million in a Series E funding round led by venture capital firm Activate Capital, the company said on Wednesday. Other new investors in the company were RTX Ventures, Seraphim, and Chemonics. The startup combines a variety of ground and space-based weather data to give corporate clients such as JetBlue and National Grid highly detailed forecasts. — AARON PRESSMAN
MEDIA
Bloomberg cancels local business program
Bloomberg has pulled the plug on “Baystate Business,” its only locally produced radio program, and laid off hosts including Kim Carrigan, Tom Moroney, and Joe Shortsleeve. The show — which aired from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. on 106.1 FM Boston/Newburyport and 92.9 HD2, and was also available as a podcast — was replaced starting Monday by “Bloomberg Businessweek,” which broadcasts across the company’s radio network. Also laid off in Boston were on-air staffers Anne Mostue and Janet Wu, and executive producer Peter Lagace. A Bloomberg spokesperson declined to comment. The company will “redeploy these resources into on-demand audio and podcasts, as well as live video streaming of our national product,” according to an internal memo from Anthony Mancini, Bloomberg’s global head of audio, that was obtained by the Globe. Besides Boston, Bloomberg has stations in New York, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco. — LARRY EDELMAN
ENERGY
Shell drops plan to cut oil production
Shell has effectively abandoned a plan to cut oil production by 1-2 percent per year until the end of the decade, instead maintaining output at current levels in a move that risks angering climate activists. Ahead of an investor update in New York on Wednesday, Europe’s largest energy company argued that it had already met the target it had set for itself in 2021 through asset sales. London-based Shell said it had seen its production drop from 1.9 million barrels of oil equivalent per day in 2019 to 1.5 million in 2022. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
AUTOMOTIVE
Toyota executives fielded challenges and reaped praise from investors at an annual general meeting Wednesday where shareholders ultimately rejected demands the automaker do better on fighting climate change. The investor proposal was initiated by AkademikerPension, a $20 billion Danish investment fund. It accused Toyota of lobbying to weaken efforts by governments around the world to phase out the internal combustion engine. Shareholders applauded in rejecting the proposal, as expected, at the meeting in Toyota city, central Japan. Some 3,800 shareholders packed a hall at Toyota headquarters. The exact number of the ballots cast will not be disclosed until Thursday, but were taken into account in the vote. The majority of Toyota shares are held by the company and its group companies, retired employees, and others sympathetic to the company’s perspective. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
LEGAL
Fired Starbucks regional manager wins $25.6 million from N.J. jury
Jurors in a federal court in New Jersey have awarded $25.6 million to a former regional Starbucks manager who alleged that she and other white employees were unfairly punished by the coffee chain after the high-profile 2018 arrests of two Black men at one of the chain’s Philadelphia locations. Shannon Phillips won $600,000 in compensatory damages and $25 million in punitive damages on Monday after an eight-member jury decided after five hours of deliberation that race was a determinative factor in Phillips’ firing, in violation of federal and state anti-discrimination laws, Law360 reports. In April 2018, a Philadelphia store manager called police on two Black men who were sitting in the coffee shop without ordering anything. Phillips, then regional manager of operations in Philadelphia, southern New Jersey, and elsewhere, had nothing to do with the arrests but lost her job less than a month later after objecting to another white manager being placed on leave amid the uproar, according to her lawsuit. — ASSOCIATED PRESS
DELIVERY
UPS and union reach deal on air conditioning for new trucks
UPS and leaders of a workers union have reached a tentative deal to equip delivery vehicles with fans and heat shields and to guarantee air conditioning in newly purchased trucks, days before a strike authorization vote concludes. The company and the Teamsters union, which represents 340,000 UPS employees, made a tentative agreement during contract bargaining that would require air conditioning in all larger delivery vehicles, smaller sprinter vans, and brown package vehicles that are purchased after Jan. 1, the union announced on Twitter. The parties are also negotiating other issues, and contract bargaining was continuing Wednesday, the Teamsters said. — WASHINGTON POST
MEDIA
Sale of two iconic British publications draws interest
The sudden prospect of an auction for the Telegraph newspaper and Spectator magazine — two of Britain’s most influential conservative titles — has sparked interest throughout the country’s media and financial elite. Earlier this month, a unit of Lloyds appointed receivers to seize the holding company for both publications and removed the Barclay family’s directors, after talks over long-running debts faltered. Brothers Frederick and David Barclay bought the Telegraph and the Spectator magazine together in 2004, in a deal worth $1.3 billion at the time. David Barclay died two years ago. Both titles are famous institutions intertwined with the upper echelons of the ruling Conservative Party. The Spectator is the world’s oldest weekly magazine still in print, founded 195 years ago, while the Daily Telegraph dates back to 1855 and claims the scoop for the outbreak of World War II. Media mogul and News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch has coveted the Spectator for decades, and bid as recently as two years ago at a value of around £50 million ($63 million), according to two people familiar with the matter. — BLOOMBERG NEWS
AGRICULTURE
USDA to beef up standards for meat labeling
The US Department of Agriculture said Wednesday it would consider implementing higher standards for meats marketed in grocery stores as ‘’humanely raised’' or antibiotic-free — claims that critics say are often exaggerated to justify their higher prices. The effort comes as USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service faces pressure to tighten oversight of marketing claims on packaged food. Consumers often pay a premium for ‘’humanely raised’' or ‘’antibiotic-free’' meat because they view it as healthier, better for the environment, or kinder to animals. But critics say the agency’s rules for allowing such claims on meat packaging are too lax, citing recent studies from animal welfare groups and science journals. Earlier this year, a report from the Animal Welfare Institute found that, of nearly 100 animal-raising claims on meat products approved by the USDA, the agency was unable to show in nearly half that the producers submitted and signed the requested affidavit about animal welfare protocols. — WASHINGTON POST